Gwmayhem wrote:

Bowie State is Division 2.  Stonehill is new to Division 1.
No mention of an exhibition.  Nov. 6  (Stonehill) I believe is opening night in college basketball.
 

Stonehill is a provisional D1 program entering year two of its upgrade from D2.  It is a small Catholic school near Brockton, MA. 
 

This whole scheduling thread is beginning to get a bit absurd.

I must have missed the last 7 years of GW basketball. Remind me, when during that time, wins over just about anyone were give me's. We have to walk before we can run. If it turns out as Gwmayhem mentioned that we go 25-8 and miss out on the tournament - SIGN ME UP! Damn, at least we will be 25-8 - something not seen around here since the Class of 2016 graduated. I don't care if we play the Little Sisters of the Poor 13x. Let's just get a winning season first before we act like we deserve something.

And, anyone harking back to the schedule we played in the ML era doesn't understand how scheduling has changed, how college basketball has changed and why that type of a schedule is no longer capable of being replicated where we currently stand. It's not as much about who GW wants to play as much as it who wants to play GW. No P5 is taking a risk playing GW with an unknown roster even at home. You could lose to a team that actually may kill your NCAA prospects as a later Q3 or Q4 team (yes possible hopefully not what happens).

On a more practical note for GW's viewpoint, it will take time for this team to jell. Other than James and Max, which player has an established college track record as someone we can count on? Antoine Smith. That's it.  It's going to take time - so not playing murderer's row or even a middling schedule early on might not be the worst thing this year.

I think CC has a plan. Let it work. By next year if all goes well this year, things will change with scheduling a bit. 

GWRising wrote:

If it turns out as Gwmayhem mentioned that we go 25-8 and miss out on the tournament - SIGN ME UP! Damn, at least we will be 25-8 - something not seen around here since the Class of 2016 graduated.

The last time GW failed to make the NCAA tournament with fewer than 10 losses was 1975-76 when we went 20-7 as an Independent.  Bob Tallent was our coach.

GWRising wrote:

This whole scheduling thread is beginning to get a bit absurd.

I must have missed the last 7 years of GW basketball. Remind me, when during that time, wins over just about anyone were give me's. We have to walk before we can run. If it turns out as Gwmayhem mentioned that we go 25-8 and miss out on the tournament - SIGN ME UP! Damn, at least we will be 25-8 - something not seen around here since the Class of 2016 graduated. I don't care if we play the Little Sisters of the Poor 13x. Let's just get a winning season first before we act like we deserve something.

And, anyone harking back to the schedule we played in the ML era doesn't understand how scheduling has changed, how college basketball has changed and why that type of a schedule is no longer capable of being replicated where we currently stand. It's not as much about who GW wants to play as much as it who wants to play GW. No P5 is taking a risk playing GW with an unknown roster even at home. You could lose to a team that actually may kill your NCAA prospects as a later Q3 or Q4 team (yes possible hopefully not what happens).

On a more practical note for GW's viewpoint, it will take time for this team to jell. Other than James and Max, which player has an established college track record as someone we can count on? Antoine Smith. That's it.  It's going to take time - so not playing murderer's row or even a middling schedule early on might not be the worst thing this year.

I think CC has a plan. Let it work. By next year if all goes well this year, things will change with scheduling a bit. 

I will agree, only you are the one that just made it absurd with this post.

We have to walk before we can run?  Says who?  Maybe you're the one not observing how programs can so quickly turnaround:

Fordham won 23 total games and 7 conference games over Jeff Neubauer's final three seasons.  Kyle Neptune began the turnaround going 16-16 in his one year there.  (What do you know?  That's the same overall record that Chris Caputo had last season.)  And then, Keith Urgo leads them to 25-8, 12-6.

Duquesne just went 20-13, 10-8, coming off of 6-24, 1-16.

But here is where you really should know better Rising.  Look at the talent that CC is bringing in.  This just wasn't possible (or let's call it highly improbable) under MoJo courtesy of the stench that this program endured in the immediate aftermath of ML-PN.  Then came Jamion who did us no favors by (at first) badly underestimating the level of player who could succeed in the A10, and then began to make up for this via the transfer market.  MoJo/JC and their players...that's been the past 6 years prior to last season.  CC brings in Max last year and then a ton of talent this upcoming season.  Are you really going to suggest that CC can't win 25 games this year with the current assembled talent because the program under different coaches with different players has been down for as long as it has?  That 6 year period means absolutely nothing to CC and this program right now.

As for scheduling, sorry but your take is borderline insane.  Nobody wants to play GW but St. Joe's, a program with a similar profile to ours and in fact, approaches this season with a more experienced nucleus, manages to play Kentucky, Villanova, Princeton, Iona and Charleston.  Three of these are road games, 1 is at home, and 1 is on a neutral court.  Please don't try to convince anyone that GW can't get this type of schedule; instead, it clearly chose not to. 

And again, I am not even lobbying for this many difficult games, particularly in light of so many new players needing to learn to play together.  But come on, GW's OOC does not even begin to remotely approach this. 

Gwmayhem wrote:

GWRising wrote:

This whole scheduling thread is beginning to get a bit absurd.

I must have missed the last 7 years of GW basketball. Remind me, when during that time, wins over just about anyone were give me's. We have to walk before we can run. If it turns out as Gwmayhem mentioned that we go 25-8 and miss out on the tournament - SIGN ME UP! Damn, at least we will be 25-8 - something not seen around here since the Class of 2016 graduated. I don't care if we play the Little Sisters of the Poor 13x. Let's just get a winning season first before we act like we deserve something.

And, anyone harking back to the schedule we played in the ML era doesn't understand how scheduling has changed, how college basketball has changed and why that type of a schedule is no longer capable of being replicated where we currently stand. It's not as much about who GW wants to play as much as it who wants to play GW. No P5 is taking a risk playing GW with an unknown roster even at home. You could lose to a team that actually may kill your NCAA prospects as a later Q3 or Q4 team (yes possible hopefully not what happens).

On a more practical note for GW's viewpoint, it will take time for this team to jell. Other than James and Max, which player has an established college track record as someone we can count on? Antoine Smith. That's it.  It's going to take time - so not playing murderer's row or even a middling schedule early on might not be the worst thing this year.

I think CC has a plan. Let it work. By next year if all goes well this year, things will change with scheduling a bit. 

I will agree, only you are the one that just made it absurd with this post.

We have to walk before we can run?  Says who?  Maybe you're the one not observing how programs can so quickly turnaround:

Fordham won 23 total games and 7 conference games over Jeff Neubauer's final three seasons.  Kyle Neptune began the turnaround going 16-16 in his one year there.  (What do you know?  That's the same overall record that Chris Caputo had last season.)  And then, Keith Urgo leads them to 25-8, 12-6.

Duquesne just went 20-13, 10-8, coming off of 6-24, 1-16.

But here is where you really should know better Rising.  Look at the talent that CC is bringing in.  This just wasn't possible (or let's call it highly improbable) under MoJo courtesy of the stench that this program endured in the immediate aftermath of ML-PN.  Then came Jamion who did us no favors by (at first) badly underestimating the level of player who could succeed in the A10, and then began to make up for this via the transfer market.  MoJo/JC and their players...that's been the past 6 years prior to last season.  CC brings in Max last year and then a ton of talent this upcoming season.  Are you really going to suggest that CC can't win 25 games this year with the current assembled talent because the program under different coaches with different players has been down for as long as it has?  That 6 year period means absolutely nothing to CC and this program right now.

As for scheduling, sorry but your take is borderline insane.  Nobody wants to play GW but St. Joe's, a program with a similar profile to ours and in fact, approaches this season with a more experienced nucleus, manages to play Kentucky, Villanova, Princeton, Iona and Charleston.  Three of these are road games, 1 is at home, and 1 is on a neutral court.  Please don't try to convince anyone that GW can't get this type of schedule; instead, it clearly chose not to. 

And again, I am not even lobbying for this many difficult games, particularly in light of so many new players needing to learn to play together.  But come on, GW's OOC does not even begin to remotely approach this. 

Apparently you know better than CC what he has and how he should schedule. And amazingly enough you knew this last Spring and Winter when the 2023-24 schedule was largely being set but GW's roster had as many as 11 open scholarships that you knew then would be filled by a "ton of talent". Stop it.

I bet next you are going to tell us you had Fordham and Duquesne turning their programs in 2022-23 around before they actually did so.

When you haven't won much of anything for 7 seasons perhaps we should first strive for a winning season to build some momentum and confidence around the program. We've endured a lot of losing. Winning does a lot of things ... it makes the program attractive to potential recruits and transfers and maybe as importantly, fans will attend in greater numbers. CC is about building the program for the long-term. He said as much on the call. There are students who have graduated and never saw a winning season. How about we just win first and then decide what kind of future schedule we need to take additional steps?

GWRising:

1)  I never claimed that I know better than CC about anything.  I am merely expressing a difference of opinion with respect to how he scheduled this year's OOC.  Perhaps next year, and future years, will be better.  

2) While it's true that some games have been on the books for a while, I would be hard-pressed to believe that the newly scheduled opponent games were arranged last winter.  The common period for scheduling these games are April-June, and sometimes, the final game or two does not wrap up until sometime in July.  

3) With respect to timing, CC knew that Hutchinson, Autry and Jones were all coming in 2022.  Buchanan, Schroeder and Johnson were announced in April.  JB finalized his decision in May.    Zam, Stretch and Antoine were added in June.  Max and Keegan were returning all along.  While CC did not know his exact final roster until June, I don't think it's a stretch to suggest that he knew enough talent had been assembled, particularly once James announced but even before this point, to conclude that his team could have handled a more challenging OOC schedule.  This is all to say that our schedule, I believe, had far more to do with CC's goal of winning 75%-80%+ OOC games than the speculative roster at the time opponents were being scheduled.

4) No, I could not have predicted the level of success that Fordham or Duquesne had last season.  I brought each up to illustrate a point...that programs can turn their fortunes around more quickly than ever.  I am not a buyer of "you have to learn how to walk before you can run" with respect to this topic.  And if I was, I'd point to the fact that CC and staff helped the team learn how to walk last season, when it won 16 games.  He did it with essentially 9 guys (I'll count Keegan who got hurt), and of that group, three are returning and three were bit players.  This year's team should definitely be improved on both ends in the front court.  In fact, Brendan Adams is the only player who I can only hope at this point will be adequately replaced.  (This is not meant as a knock on Ricky or Hunter.  I just feel that we will be better at those positions.  I understand this is debatable.)

5) GW73, what I am discussing is the difference of just a handful of games.  I would have felt much better about this schedule had the team scheduled 2-3 road games against higher level programs.  I have always believed that our players deserve the opportunity to play in a few big-time games.  GW teams have been blown out in Cameron Indoor and Allen Fieldhouse but I guarantee that the GW players who competed in those games have memories that will last a lifetime.  And needless to say, there's no guarantee that GW gets blown out in such a game.  Rising's argument that Power 5 schools just won't host GW is a lot of hot air.  A couple of such games could have been scheduled. 
 

Am not disagreeing with what you are saying, only with your position (and CC's if yours are one and the same).

Many here have said in the past that their goal for this program ought to be to realistically compete for an NCAA tournament slot annually.  This schedule literally takes away this opportunity.  You were around in 2005-06 when the day the schedule was released, I went ballistic along with a number of others.  And that schedule had a road game at nationally ranked NC State, plus a neutral court game against nationally ranked at the time Maryland.  The injury to Pops aside (and he was back to play in the tournament), a 26-2 record resulting in a #8 seed may simply be explained by playing a very weak OOC schedule. 

There is certainly a better than 50/50 chance that all of this is a moot point, that we don't have a gaudy enough record to warrant an NCAA bid, even with this schedule.  I recognize this and have all along.  Nevertheless, why would you want to craft a schedule that all but eliminates any possibility of receiving an at large?  Especially when all it would have taken to not do this would be to flip two crappy games for two challenging tests?  Lose those two tough games and you're not dancing.  Win big in our OOC and we're still not going dancing.  Win one or both of those challenging tests and then who knows?

Last point, I understand that lots of schools may not have wanted to play us.  All I can say is watch how many A10 teams will go on the road, not even in a MTE but a true road game, against a challenging opponent.  Am pretty sure this can be done, even for GW.
 

Gwmayhem wrote:

You were around in 2005-06 when the day the schedule was released, I went ballistic along with a number of others.  And that schedule had a road game at nationally ranked NC State, plus a neutral court game against nationally ranked at the time Maryland.  The injury to Pops aside (and he was back to play in the tournament), a 26-2 record resulting in a #8 seed may simply be explained by playing a very weak OOC schedule. 
 

Naw, I think we were criminally under-seeded because of our quick exit in the A-10 tournament which should've been easily explained by the Pops injury.

Doing some quick Quad math on that team's schedule based on KenPom (so not exactly how the quads are calculated), the 05-06 team was:

Quad 1: 3-1
Quad 2: 4-1
Quad 3: 8-0
Quad 4: 11-0

St. Mary's was a 5 seed in this year's tourney.  They went:

Quad 1: 2-3
Quad 2: 7-2
Quad 3: 11-2
Quad 4: 5-0

So St. Mary's had a few more Q2 and Q3 games but that was somewhat a function of a better WCC vs. the A10 (again, making CC's point that inflating the NET for the bottom of the conference helps the top teams bc a good chunk of our Q4 games came in conference). 

Some may say our resume looks like FAUs and they'd be right, but FAU was also under seeded as a 9 (as evidenced by their run in the tournament).  I do wonder how FAU would've done had they played Purdue instead of FDU in the 2nd round.  Alternativley, how far would GW have gone playing Southern in the 2nd round and Pops getting healthier by the day?

Last edited by GW0509 (8/09/2023 3:50 pm)

Gwmayhem wrote:

GW went 3-1 in Q1?  Loss at NC State, win on neutral court vs. Maryland.  At Xavier I am guessing?  What was the other game?
 

Based on KenPom, the UMD neutral site game is a Q2 but that’s the final KenPom which factors in UMD’s NIT loss so it probably WAS another Q1 at the time of the NCAA tournament.

The Q1 games were @ NC State, @ Temple, @ Xavier,  @ St Joes.

Looking back on it, Marshall on the Road and BU at Home are two games we should’ve upgraded. The others were big enough beatdowns which helped our efficiency ratings (if NET existed in 2006).

Maybe something like @ St Johns and home vs Hofstra. Replaces a Q3 and Q4 for two Q2s.

Last edited by GW0509 (8/09/2023 6:54 pm)

King:

1) I don't see much evidence here of GW looking down upon AU.  The past 7 years have been humbling for the most part and AU played very well in knocking off two subpar GW teams.  Credit to your squad for that.

2) To be fair, prior to recent games, GW had won 9 straight and 11 of 12 vs AU from 1991-2018.  The average margin of victory in those 11 games was over 17 points per game.

3) GW has played at Bender, in 1996, 1998 and 2003, but not since then.  Personally, I think local rivalries are great and would love to play AU on a 2 for 1 basis with 1 out of very 3 games taking place at Bender Arena.  Much like GW has often been fired up to play Maryland throughout the years, I suspect AU would approach these games similarly, and might even hold their own much like GW has done against Maryland.